There is art. There is science. There is a science to art. There is an art to science. But art should not be subsumed into a science, and science should not be subsumed into an art. If we go too far in either direction, we will start missing half of the fullness of life. One life becomes one that appears to experience feeling but is cold and calculated, and the other appears to grounded in reason but it based on senseless conviction. Both these worlds are dangerous, and either represent an imbalance in our growth as a species.
There is nothing wrong with artificial intelligence (AI) in itself. It comes from science—it is based in algorithms. However, how it is being used now constitutes an imbalance: it has taken over too much of the other sphere of life, which is art. The algorithm went from being a tool to making too much of a complete creation, for instance in terms of visual art pieces and in full essays, stories, poems, and creative audio work.
There is an issue with the argument “AI is just like the calculator”—the idea that because calculators have automated doing math by hand that the same should be applied to art. Math tends to have one correct answer to questions, and specific methods of arriving at them. It belongs under the realm of science. Art is not about correct answers or specific solutions, it is about expressing yourself in the process, and finding your own answer. That is the most important part of art, because by doing so you find yourself. We are automating away how art gives life its meaning. One half of life is being subsumed by the other half.
In math everything boils down to 1s and 0s, but art and self-expression are not the same. AI machine learning make art appear reducible to 1s and 0s, in terms of categorized words and labels of prompting. It is often hyped up as an impressive creator of art, but its algorithms are futile without the totality of the art of artists and their self-expression, which the machine consumes to subsist itself.
Computer scientists may look at art and see data, but what this data is to artists is their personal expression. Thus, they do not come from a real understanding or empathy for the purpose of art, or the artists behind it. The data-driven approach towards art comes from a mere scientific understanding that lacks balance. Science is neutral, but by itself also consists only one-half of life. It is encroaching too much into the other half of life, the realm of art, by scraping artwork from the internet without thought to the feelings of the artists whose works are used, reducing their work to algorithms, and caused devastation to the ecosystem of artists and their livelihoods. The degree this is carried out is scientism, not science.
Though pretty images are generated as a result, what is lost is the real purpose behind art. As science is meant to help us be rational, systematic, and see things impersonally—what art is meant to do is humanize, empathize, and self-express. But we cannot reduce what art provides down to the processes of science, otherwise scientism prevails, and we will have a world that has the superficiality of appearing to feel, humanize, empathize, or self-express, but does none of those. What an empty world that would be.
